Phaedrus' lesson

Rana rupta et bos

Inops, potentem dum vult imitari, perit.

In prato quondam rana conspexit bovem,
et tacta invidia tantae magnitudinis
rugosam inflavit pellem. Tum natos suos
interrogavit an bove esset latior.
Illi negarunt. Rursus intendit cutem
maiore nisu, et simili quaesivit modo,
quis maior esset. Illi dixerunt 'bovem'.
Novissime indignata, dum vult validius
inflare sese, rupto iacuit corpore.

Phaedrus, Fabulae, Liber Primus,  XIV

Leafing through the pages of an on-line Latin library, this evening, I found this short, simple and meaningful Aesopian style fabula  from Phaedrus. Beside taking me back to the time of my early Latin studies (which, to be honest, were not so brilliant until I understood its universal beauty and started devouring stacks of Latin writers' books), it makes me think to the recent evolution of my professional career. In these days, I'm spending eight hours a day delving into thousands of code lines, pulling and connecting thousands of virtual wires and writing more and more text lines every day.

This is not exactly what I've been aiming at in the recent years. Yet, I must confess that I find this "practice" somehow comfortable, as it's been the kind of work I've been doing for more than ten years, before. I'm used at it, in some extent I'm a master (a "specialist") at doing it. But this doesn't necessarily mean that I should do it for the rest of my life. The underlying risk is to give out the message that this is the kind of things I love to do and excel.

No. It is not exactly like this. I can do more (and I demonstrated it several times) but, probably, I aimed at the wrong direction or with the wrong weapons.

I think I've already written something about, here, so I won't linger too much on this again. If anyone wants to know some more, then it's the right opportunity to read some of my recent posts. This short poem from Phaedrus injected (or refreshed) me the doubt that I was not simply felt as "not-ready-yet" but rather as "unable" (inops). I don't find this frustrating, as someone dared and tried to convince me, I find it ... irritating, a real dive into disillusion. Feels like I was certain having passed the shadow-line, turned back to see what I was leaving back and ... found myself in the dark again.

For the very first time I'm feeling the need for a big change.

No pictures today.